Just like love itself, Valentine’s Day is aswirl in mythology, misinformation, fear and fantasy. To help you navigate the romantic minefields, here are the V-Day facts from A to Z.
Aphrodisiacs: There is little scientific evidence supporting the existence of aphrodisiacs, but the capsaicin in peppers is the closest thing. It causes an increased heart rate, blood flow, heavy breathing, and sweating — though it also sets your mouth on fire, and much like love, can leave you in tears.
Birds: In the Middle Ages, women predicted the kind of man they would marry based on what bird they saw first on the 14th. Goldfinch meant rich man, blackbird meant clergyman, dove meant good man, and woodpecker — sorry, miss, that meant no man at all.
Cupid: He used to be depicted as a slender young man with fairy-wings who sharpened his arrows on a whetstone stained with blood. Over time Cupic turned into a chubby cherub, an allusion to the offspring that result from romantic escapades — and a kind of yucky suggestion that a naked infant armed with a deadly weapon is what gets people horny.
Divorce: Divorce filings rise as much as 40 percent around V-Day, as do Internet searches for divorce lawyers. Why is this? February falls on the heels of the winter holidays, always a dependable source of marital strife. With the approach of spring, V-Day is the time many people make good on their New Year’s resolution to start the year fresh — with a divorce!
Economy: In 1969, Pope Paul VI removed St. Valentine’s Day as a feast day from the Roman calendar, officially surrendering February 14th into the custody of Hallmark. Retailers are the new patron saint of Valentine’s, and as a result, romance is something Americans can conveniently purchase. According to a recent study, adults in the U.S. are expected to spend a total of $17.6 billion this V-Day, which works out to around $125 per person (with the average male spending about twice as much as the average female).
Forbidden: The U.S., U.K., Canada, Mexico, France, Belgium, and Australia celebrate V-Day. Other countries? Not so much. Iranian officials threaten to punish those who celebrate the holiday. Members of the Hindu political party in India and Pakistan publicly burn Valentine’s cards. And Uzbekistan, getting ahead of the curve, has proactively canceled concerts and any other activities with that voluptuous V-Day vibe.
Greeting Cards: In 1844, Esther Howland was the first to mass-produce and patent a lacy Valentine’s Day card in the U.S. Now Hallmark, which produced its first Valentines in 1913, creates around 2,000 different cards each year. According to the greeting card company, around 200 million cards are given each V-Day, costing Americans around $277 million. But the first recorded Valentine’s card may not have been so cheery: It was sent in 1415 by the English Duke of Orleans from his jail cell in the Tower of London. (Happy V-Day, wish you were here?)
Heart: A wide variety of primitive cultures have independently described the heart as the factory of human emotions and love. This can be explained by the shared experience of an accelerated pulse, as well as the sensation of your heart skipping a beat during moments of arousal. The origin of the iconic “heart” shape is a bit more mysterious. Some suggest it derived from the seeds of the silphium plant, which was used as an herbal contraceptive. Others believe it represents various parts of the female anatomy. Guess which parts.
Impotence Awareness Day: Staying true to the commercial roots of modern V-Day, Pfizer funded the first Impotence Awareness Day in the U.K. on February 14, 2000. The company did this not so much to raise awareness of erectile dysfunction (ED), the potentially life-threatening medical problems associated with impotence, or the one-third of men between 40 and 70 who suffer from some significant form of ED. They did it — surprise! — to sell Viagra. More Viagra prescriptions are written the week before V-Day than at any other time of the year.
Jewelry: While only about 19 percent of U.S. adults plan to buy jewelry this Valentine’s Day, the $4.1 billion they will spend on these gifts is expected to exceed every other category, including the money spent on romantic evenings out. Bob Serata, of Bernie’s & Son in St. Pete, compares the holiday to Mother’s Day in terms of sales, but adds that it is nowhere near as important for his business as Christmas. Most of his Valentine’s customers are men, and most of them wait to do their jewelry shopping until the last possible minute.
Kissing: A relatively new human behavior, kissing is thought to have several biological benefits. 1. Men pass testosterone to their partners through their saliva, potentially boosting their partner’s libido. 2. Kissing puts partners close enough to smell each other, allowing their subconscious to assess each other’s immune system. 3. A woman’s breath can give clues to her reproductive status. During menstruation, women typically have more bacteria in their mouth, causing bad breath. 4. Kissing helps build a woman’s resistance to a saliva-dwelling pathogen which can cause birth defects if introduced during pregnancy. Isn’t it romantic?
Lupercalia: The Feast of Lupercalia is widely considered the precursor to V-Day, as Pope Gelsius converted this popular Roman holiday into Saint Valentine’s Day around 500 A.D.. Lupercalia was a purification and fertility celebration held between Feb. 13 and 15 in ancient Rome. In one of the holiday’s many traditions, young men known as the Luperci ran around Rome naked, lashing people with bloody goatskins. Women struck with these goatskins could expect to have a healthy and easy childbirth. These strips were called februa, meaning, to make clean. This is also the root word for February.
Mistress Day: Feb. 13 is quickly becoming known as Mistress Day. If a cheater does not spend Feb. 14 with his wife, she will grow suspicious. However, if he waits until after V-Day to celebrate with his mistress, his lover will feel second-rate. A common excuse cheaters use to get away on the 13th? They’re going gift-shopping! (See “Jewelry.”)
Name Games: During the festival of Lupercalia, unmarried males selected their dates for the night by drawing names from a bowl — kind of an early precursor of the key party (if this reference puzzles you, rent The Ice Storm). A note about names: Shelley Venderhorst of Green Bench Flowers in St. Pete warns clients against sending flowers from “a secret admirer”; mystery bouquets smack of stalking and tend to provoke distressed calls to the florists. “Sending flowers anonymously is not a good thing anymore,” Venderhorst said.
Oral: If you’re a man hoping to bring your Valentine date to a head, here are some culinary tips to sweeten the deal: Drink plenty of water and load up on fruits full of natural sugars. (Pineapple is a particular favorite.) Avoid garlic. (And if you’re on the giving end of the transaction and your partner insisted on asparagus at dinner, try locally produced Masque strips; they’ll knock out your taste buds.)
Prophylactics: Condom companies and health organizations have tried to rebrand the 14th as National Condom Day — almost as sexy as Impotence Awareness Day.
Quirkyalone Day: Anti-Valentine’s celebrations like Quirkyalone Day and S.A.D. (Single Awareness Day) claim that they are not anti-relationship, just against the commercialization thereof and the idea that you need to be in one to feel happy and fulfilled. Notably, these alternative celebrations are almost exclusively created by, and designed for women. And really, they’re sorta kinda s.a.d.
Red Roses: Between 110 to 200 million stems of roses will be sold in the U.S. for V-Day. While the most common delivery is a dozen long-stem red roses, in recent years Shelley Venderhorst of Green Bench Flowers has noticed a trend of women sending a single rose to their partners on the 13th. Which is either a nice gesture or a none-too-subtle hint that the guy better reciprocate on the 14th.
Sweets: While conversation hearts may taste like Tums, they keep getting produced by the millions. And since you will have no interest in actually eating these candies, it is helpful to know that they have a shelf life of five years — perfect for re-gifting.
Titty Tuesday: I could ramble on about how strip clubs experience a slight spike in business on V-Day, but “Titty Tuesday” is merely a mnemonic device to help you (heterosexual) men remember that Valentine’s falls on a Tuesday this year.
USPS & UPS: The popularity of V-Day cards was fueled by the drop in postage rates toward the end of the 1800s. During that time, obscene and offensive cards, dubbed “Vinegar Valentines” or “Penny Dreadfuls,” became so popular that Chicago’s post office refused to deliver over 25,000 of them. FYI: UPS was actually founded on V-Day in 1919.
Valentine: There are at least eight Saint Valentines. Valentine of Terni and Valentine of Rome are generally considered the patrons of the holiday, but their stories are virtually identical. The Roman Emperor, “Claudius the Cruel,” banned Christianity and forbade marriage. He thought single men made better soldiers. Both Valentines were jailed for illegally marrying couples, as well as for practicing their pagan religion. Before one of the saints was beheaded on Feb. 14, around 270 A.D., he allegedly wrote a note to the jailer’s daughter, with whom he had fallen in love — or perhaps he just wanted her to help him escape. According to the legend, he signed the note, “Your Valentine.”
Weddings: St. Valentine was executed for marrying couples according to a then pagan religion, Christianity. Now Christian groups are among the most vocal opponents of same-sex marriage. Ironic, eh? So how about we give Feb. 14 a new subtitle: Gay Marriage Day. LGBT couples, join the innumerable heteros who get hitched on Valentine’s Day and make a statement about freedom of (or is that freedom from?) religion at the same time. Just make sure you have plane fare to Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont, Washington, D.C. — and pretty soon, Washington State — because those are the only states (so far) that have legalized same-sex marriage.
XXX: X-treme sex, X-rated injuries, and X-rays. Emergency rooms experience a spike in sex-related injuries on V-Day. Older men have heart attacks, couples slip in the shower, romantic candles and massage oils lead to conflagrations. Shayne Arnone, general manager of The Todd Adult Superstore, pointed out that in recent years fetish and bondage gear has become increasingly popular around Valentine’s. The quest to try kinky acts or new positions often puts novice couples in a bind. Here are a few tips for avoiding the ER this V-Day. 1. Never stick anything lacking a flared end in your butt (every ER has a file of x-rays dedicated to items people have “accidentally” lodged in themselves). 2. Police-grade handcuffs only seem sexier than the toy version until you have to call the locksmith. 3. Sex on the beach can be like using sandpaper as a condom.
Yes: It’s impossible to know how many people get engaged on V-Day, although I’m sure in a few years market researchers will be able to give us a reasonable estimate based on tweets and status updates. We do know that V-Day is one of the four most popular days to propose, along with Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and the bride-to-be’s birthday. Bob Serata of Bernie’s & Sons confirms this spike in engagement ring purchases around the holiday. However, he notes that the engagement rings that are bought around Valentine’s tend to contain smaller stones.
Zymurgy: Zymurgy is the chemistry involved in fermentation. As such, it is the closet thing we have to a love potion. Unfortunately, no one describes alcohol as an aphrodisiac because it does not so much make you want to have sex as it obliterates your apprehensions. And, as with anything, it only works in moderation. After a certain number of drinks, alcohol makes partners more likely to argue than to have sex. And whiskey dick is never, ever sexy.
This article appears in Feb 9-15, 2012.